Ever since Donald Trump won the election, Obama’s White House has been trying to thwart what America elected him to do in any way it possibly can.

One of the most pernicious ways of doing this, first reported over the summer by outlets like The New York Times, was a blanket pardon for illegal immigrants.

However, for those who worried that the White House might commit the ultimate perfidy to make sure that, as the popular liberal bromide goes, “demographics is destiny,” White House Domestic Policy Council Director Cecilia Munoz had good news for you.

According to The Washington Times, Munoz said in a podcast interview that Obama wouldn’t be pardoning any illegal immigrants, indicating that the president lacked the power to pardon DREAMers and adding that this lay primarily with Congress.

While this has never stopped Barack Obama before, Munoz seemed pretty firm when getting across that this was definitely outside of the scope of Obama’s abilities.

“It’s not an answer here,” Munoz told the podcast. “I know people are hoping that pardon authority is a way to protect people.

“It’s ultimately not, for a couple reasons,” Munoz explained. “One is that pardon authority is generally designed for criminal violations, not civil. But also it doesn’t confer legal status. Only Congress can do that.

“So ultimately, it wouldn’t protect a single soul from deportation,” she added.

According to the International Business Times, the rumors intensified after a letter from Democrat California Reps. Zoe Lofgren and Lucille Roybal-Allard and Illinois Democrat Rep. Luis Gutierrez urged the president to pardon those who were currently protected under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, in addition to halting all deportations.

“We are asking the president to pardon them for their undocumented status,” Rep. Gutierrez, said earlier this month, proving once again that he hasn’t much of a clue about how American immigration law and the Constitution work. “This would not give them a permanent safe place, but it is a start.”

While the president has the constitutional power to pardon all those for “offenses against the United States,” this doesn’t include giving individuals legal status in the United States, which means they would still be subject to deportation.

Proponents like Lofgren and Gutierrez point to blanket pardons issued to Confederate troops after the Civil War or to draft dodgers after the Vietnam War, although these were prima facie different in several obvious ways — most notably, they weren’t used specifically to thwart a change in administration and they involved those who had citizenship in the United States.

All in all, it’s yet another sign that President Obama’s pen and phone are running out of ink and prepaid minutes.